Monday, July 28, 2008

And then I drank the watermelon beer and all was right in the world

Almost every summer I go to the Oregon Brewers Festival and almost every year I stand around thinking, "Wow, 20 minute long lines for tiny plastic mugs of beer. This is so incredibly lame. And do all these jackholes really have to go 'wooooo' every 5 seconds?"

And then I start drinking. And then I'm suddenly assimilated into the fest's mob of roaming beer snobs, all of us waiting and drinking and yelling "woooo" between attempts to come up with new sexual puns for "hoppiness," the newly arrived glaring at me in the same manner I had glared at those who had come before me.

This year the watermelon beer is what got me over that initial hump o' skepticism. Some might write off a beer with a name like "Come Hell or High Watermelon" as a cheap gimmick but I'm sure the same was once said about things like pumpkin beer and adding lime wedges to Corona, which effectively turns an otherwise crap beer into liquefied manna from heaven. So here's what a watermelon beer looks like:

It's mighty tasty and this statement is coming from someone who would rather blow one up than put any part of a watermelon in my mouth. It's too bad that the nearest place that sells the stuff is most likely in the Bay area.

The alcoholic ginger ale was also a pleasant surprise. A second trip to the festival on Saturday also made me the proud new owner of a pretzel necklace and a business card for something called "utilikits" (link).

The necklace was sold to me by a brilliant entrepreneur who rode up and down the waterfront selling them over a fence to attendees with the aid of a fishing pole. Also included: a large pretzel medallion, all for the low, low price of 3 bucks. In hindsight, I wish I had taken a photo of the necklace instead of the utilikilts card.